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Maverick second-guesses himself a hundred times as he takes the long winding walking route from officers’ to student quarters on the other side of the compound. Normally, these already-lieutenants would have been housed in the same building as he–it’s a stroke of (mis)fortune that all the officers’ rooms had been taken for the duration of their special detachment.
So close, yet so far. It’s another thing that snags on Maverick’s heart that’s always honing in on Bradley–Rooster, whether in the sky or in the classroom, hoping against foolish hope that the kid would look at him with something else in his eyes besides hate.
He’d dismissed them all early, finding himself suddenly dumbstruck and wrong-footed from hearing Hangman’s words and Rooster’s reaction. He turns the scene over and over in his mind, trying to analyze it from every angle like a mission debrief.
What could you have done? Why are you dead?
Maverick takes a deep breath as the path winds closer to the students’ dorm building, the military-gray stark against the sunset-colored sky. It fills him with a sense of foreboding, because why the hell is he even here?
He’s their teacher. That means something, even in the Navy, and he should’ve been able to steer the conversation towards something more productive and lesson-enhancing. Something that didn’t involve weighty words like the past and fathers and broken canopies and old mistakes and a whole lot of regret.
He’s their commanding officer. For the duration of their special deployment in this assignment, they answer to him first and Admiral Simpson second. That means something, especially for the Navy, where they are bound to the rules of the hierarchy that govern their every interaction. They’re supposed to call him sir, even if it grates on his looser sensibilities. They’re supposed to follow his every order, and if they’re going to go through this jump-and-ask-how-high rigmarole, Maverick is going to try his damnedest to make sure that means that all of them will obediently fly home alive, no matter how Admiral Simpson tells him that they understand the risks. He’s supposed to not tolerate insubordination, like cutting remarks in the classroom or blatant disrespect in the sky. He’s supposed to keep them under control, until their objective is achieved.
He’s also Bradley’s–Rooster’s…something. Godfather, unofficially, because Goose and Carole had put a newborn into his arms and laughed when he froze and immediately pledged to keep him in one piece. Legal guardian until 18, officially, because Carole still had enough strength to sign a few papers before she left and there was no way in hell Mav was going to let that sweet little boy enter the unforgiving system. Biggest enemy, currently–because Mav had kept his promise to a dying mother who deserved to have her memory untainted, whose only crime was loving her son.
Anyway. He’s supposed to be all of these and more, but Maverick has spent many years of his life failing at what he has to be. A better pilot would have gotten his RIO home. A better father figure wouldn’t have let his eighteen-year-old storm out of his house and life, leaving a burning trail of anger behind. A better instructor would have stopped those remarks in their tracks, not be burnt by them as collateral.
Out of these three, there is only enough time and probability in the world to address one of them, and Maverick is getting real tired of the feeling of failure.
So he squares his shoulders, and gets ready to enter the dorm building—then he hears the sound of a scuffle just around the corner.
“You had no fucking right, Seresin!”
That’s Bradley’s voice. Maverick quickens his steps then flattens himself against the wall when he chances a peek around the corner and sees the two culprits from class, still at each other’s throats. He groans inwardly in exasperation and tips his head against the wall. He’s familiar with this kind of young buck bullfighting in the Navy (as Ice will attest), but his older years have given him the benefit of hindsight and just a slight tinge of annoyance.
“You need to get out of your head, Bradshaw. I just nudged you along the way.”
In contrast to Bradley’s emotion-filled tone, Jake seems calm and almost bored.
“So you bring up my dad? Maverick? You don’t know what happened!”
“Everyone knows what happened,” Jake says dismissively, and Maverick swallows a lump in his throat. “Your old man was Maverick’s RIO. Maverick was flying, your old man in the backseat. Something went wrong, and your old man didn’t make it back.”
Stop.
“Stop,” Bradley grits out through clenched teeth, unknowingly echoing Maverick’s silent plea.
“Is that why you’re getting on his nerves, Bradshaw? Is that why you can’t fly straight when he’s in the sky?”
Bradley doesn’t reply, and Maverick imagines him nodding. When she was alive, Carole had one rule: no lying to Bradley, especially about Goose’s death. In her version of the story, one told many times over to a curious and grieving boy, Maverick was the closest thing Goose had to a brother. When Goose died, Maverick had tried his best to protect him. Maverick would have saved him, if he could.
And so Bradley had accepted Maverick’s hugs, Saturday outings, birthday celebrations, and midnight stories—without an ounce of blame.
That didn’t mean that Maverick didn’t blame himself. But for years, all the guilt he carried had crumbled, little by little, taken apart by little hands and re-molded into something softer and more tender.
And then Bradley turned eighteen, and Maverick had to do the hardest thing in his life.
Suddenly, all the guilt was back like a rock landslide, and all the blame was back on the table. There were many daggers that Bradley could throw, and all Maverick could do was wait and close his eyes to feel where they landed.
“Because listen, I never knew my biological dad but I’ve known a few good foster parents, and if someone were to hurt them–”
“I don’t hate him for my dad’s death,” Bradley says fiercely, matter-of-fact in a way that makes Maverick’s heart crumble. He files away the new information about Hangman too, because it feels too achingly familiar.
“I don’t,” he says again, emphatically, because Jake must have given him an unbelieving look. Maverick’s heart feels rearranged and put back together, like the Lego model plane he got Bradley for his eighth birthday. “It was a technical failure. Mav–Captain Mitchell was cleared of all wrongdoing. So if you ever open your mouth about that ever again, you can expect more than a bloody nose.”
Unbidden, Admiral Simpson’s words play in Maverick’s ears. Does Rooster see it that way?
He does, Maverick thinks back to the ghost in his head, slightly smug yet exceedingly disbelieving. Improbably, the landslide of blame recedes in light of Bradley’s protective warmth. He does.
It’s several seconds before Jake speaks, his curiosity piqued now.
“So what’s got your goat, Bradshaw? What’s the deal with you and him?”
“I told you before, it’s none of your business.”
“Yeah, right before the two of you locked into a tailspin to certain death. Seriously, man, the rest of us can’t deal with this.”
Maverick winces. He had hoped that the tension with Rooster would go unnoticed by the rest of the team, but that was apparently too much to hope for.
Bradley snorts. “Yeah? You and Phoenix both. She came to me telling me to shape up or they’d be left with you.”
“Still not a bad choice,” Jake says confidently, and Maverick isn’t looking but he can clearly imagine the kid’s chest puffing out like a ridiculous peacock.
God, they’re so young.
“So why are you mad at him?”
There’s a pause, and Maverick cranes his neck as far as it can go without being seen, placing his ear close to the corner.
“He pulled my papers from the naval academy.”
Jake whistles, and Maverick is crushed, buried by the landslide all over again.
“That’s it?”
Bradley’s look on his face must be incredulous, if Maverick’s widened eyes are anything to go by.
Bradley splutters. “‘That’s it?’ What do you mean, ‘that’s it?’”
Maverick chances another glance, because that revelation and succeeding question are almost too much damage to take in a few seconds. He can see Bradley’s shoulders shaking in barely-repressed anger, but Jake has gone back to his disinterested look, shrugging.
“It’s just–I thought it would be something else. Why’d he do it? Did he leave you guys after your old man–”
No!
“No,” Bradley replies, less fiery and more quiet, but no less sure. “He stayed. He–practically raised me. Him and mom.”
“Was he good to you?”
“What the hell are these questions–”
“Was he good to you?” And Jake’s voice is ice-cold, with none of the devil-may-care attitude earlier. He’s serious, dead-set on getting his answer, and Maverick makes a mental note to look up his file later. There are darker implications in his words, if his sudden seriousness was anything to go by.
Bradley pauses, and he must have seen something in the other man’s face because he answers the question.
“Yes,” he replies, to all the unasked questions, and Jake’s iciness melts a little. “He was–he was great.” Maverick closes his eyes, hyper-focused on the past tense. “He–I never wanted for more, as a kid. We didn’t have much but we had each other, and flying. All I ever wanted was to be like him.”
And Goose, Maverick mentally adds. And Carole, sweetheart. Come on, don’t set your sights too low.
“So when he pulled your papers—”
“It felt like a betrayal of everything we were together.” Bradley’s voice doesn’t shake, but it’s tortured enough to make Maverick want to sprint around the corner and hug his boy tight. “If he didn’t want me in the skies, he probably never wanted me at all.”
It’s the dagger thrown, and it hits its mark. Maverick’s soul feels cut to ribbons, his guts turned inside out and his heart slows to an almost-stop. Goose and Carole had entrusted him with their boy, their precious treasure who called him Uncle Mav, and he had gone and made the brightest bundle of joy feel unloved and unwanted. He had kept the boy alive, kept his promise to Carole, but for all his best intentions, he had failed in loving him. The knowledge of that failure almost brings him to his knees–when he would do anything, give anything, sacrifice anything, to make sure the young man around the corner was alive and loved deeply.
“Yeah, I just don’t think that’s it, Bradshaw.”
“I’m getting real tired of your unsolicited comments, Seresin–”
Maverick doesn’t know where this is going. He’s their teacher and commanding officer; he should have stepped in long before now. He’s Bradley’s–failure of a godfather; he shouldn’t have been here in Top Gun at all.
“Look, one orphan to another–” Maverick winces again, “–I know what unloving parents look like, alright? They hate your guts and wish you weren’t alive to bother and mess up their own lives. I’ve seen the way he looks at you when you walk away from him. That’s not hate.”
Bradley pauses for a second. “So what is it?”
“Ah ah, not telling you that,” Jake teases, probably with a smirk on his face, and Maverick doesn’t know whether to roll his eyes or sigh in exasperation as the bullfighting picks up again. “You’re gonna have to carry on a conversation and look him in the eyes to find out. Ten bucks says you can’t, Bradshaw.”
“You’re full of shit, Seresin.”
“Hey, I’m telling you the old man loves you. That’s as non-shitty as they come.”
“It doesn’t excuse what he did,” Bradley’s voice is cold now, and Maverick wants to shrink back like a coward. Like a criminal.
“Yeah,” Jake agrees. “It doesn’t. But if he looks at you like that? Maybe he’s got a reason.”
Bradley goes silent, and Jake exhales. “Look, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry for what I said.”
Bradley huffs. “Then why did you say it?”
Despite his better judgment, Maverick pokes his head around the corner again to find out.
Jake shrugs, the epitome of poise even when found out. “I know it and you know it, Bradshaw. There’s twelve of us here but it’s going to end up with the two of us at the tip of the spear.” He smirks. “Just making sure my wingman’s in good shape.”
“Fuck you,” Bradley says automatically.
Maverick huffs a little to himself as he turns back to lay himself flat against the wall. Presumptuous, but not entirely wrong. Out of the class, Jake and Bradley stand out–for their skill, but also for their flaws. It keeps him awake at night thinking of sending the both of them together on a mission like this–just because he is very well-acquainted with this kind of aviator combination, and how wrong (or how well) it could go. Again, Ice would attest to that.
“I’ll tell you one thing, Bradshaw,” Jake says seriously. “I know my reputation precedes me–”
“Oh shut–”
“–but I know what it’s like to have no one. Shuffled around in the system, you know? So if that’s the only thing you have against the man who apparently raised you–well. Seems to me like you’ve got a lot of thinking to do.”
Heart in his throat, Maverick chooses this moment to peek around the corner again–
–and his timing is entirely wrong, because while Rooster’s back is to him, Hangman is currently facing in his direction, looking at him over Bradley’s shoulder.
Jake just grins as he catches Maverick’s eye, not giving anything away as he claps his hand on Bradley’s shoulder and turns around to leave. “See you tomorrow, Rooster.”
Maverick backs away too, reluctant to leave but knowing he would only make things worse if Bradley saw him there. Jake’s footsteps fade away, and Maverick is absolutely ready to run for it when he hears a body slump against the wall, and the groaning of quiet anger.
Bradley slides down the wall until he sits on the asphalt, hands on his knees and head bowed because he just had an emotional conversation with Hangman of all people, and he needs time to process that shitshow.
He’s barely taken two breaths before he sees a pair of boots come along beside him out of the corner of his eye. “Go away,” he rasps.
The presence takes a seat beside him in blatant defiance, and he’s horrified to smell that ever-familiar scent of aftershave mixed with smoke. He’d bolt and run if he could, but that conversation with Seresin had somehow damaged all his fight or flight responses. With a few smirks and well-placed jabs, Hangman had sincerely sown doubt into the very foundation of the anger that had driven Bradley through living for the last fifteen years.
It’s enough to make Bradley pull his hair out.
”I said go away,” he says again, trying to get back some of that anger while fighting himself against taking up Jake on his bet, wondering just what it was that Hangman saw in the eyes of the old man.
”I’ve always wanted you,” is the reply, and Bradley freezes. He looks up, incredulous, and sees the old man beside him, who’s looking straight ahead and decidedly not meeting his eyes. This close, he can see the wrinkles that weren’t there before, the skin tanned and even more leathery after countless hours in the cockpit sun, the hints of gray at the temples. He had taken comfort in the distance, before. It had been easy to taunt and goad from an opposite aircraft, ensconced in his own cockpit with an easy escape route. It had been maliciously self-satisfying to throw verbal shots of his own from his classroom seat, watching the man in front try to dodge and recollect himself and respond back.
It had been easy, with the distance. Now, their uniformed arms are almost touching, only a few inches apart where they sit on the cooling asphalt. The building’s shadows lengthen as the sun sinks lower, and Bradley suddenly remembers that he hasn’t responded at all.
But Captain Mitchell—Mav just sits there, waiting, not quite meeting Bradley’s eyes, gaze somewhere far away.
”What?” Bradley tries, throat scratchy with unbelief.
His commanding officer, his godfather, the man who raised and taught him everything he knows, for all intents and purposes his dad—closes his eyes and finally, finally turns his way.
”I’ve always wanted you.” The words are let go slowly, little by little, desperately, like slipping pearls off a string. They’re drops of water to Bradley’s heart long-parched by the desert fires of his anger, and he drinks them up greedily before he remembers that he’s supposed to be angry.
“I’ve always wanted you, and I will always, always love you.”
There’s not much Maverick knows how to do except fly and mess up the lives of those he loves most, so as he launches he prays for some sort of miracle.
Bradley looks into his father’s eyes as he says those words, searching for—something, ready to prove Hangman wrong while simultaneously praying that maybe, maybe his rival had gotten it right.
Growing up, Mav had always been the calm in the storm. Years of buried memories well up inside of him as he remembers those knowing eyes full of reassurance, whether it was a nightmare or an impossible math problem. The first time he had gone up in the P-51 with Mav, he had realized what those eyes reminded him of: the sky, clear and blue on a good summer’s day, brimming with possibility and adventure.
He hadn’t seen what was in those eyes on the night he stormed out of the house, the Naval Academy’s regretful letter bunched up in his fist.
He hadn’t seen—never really cared to look—what was in those eyes when he challenged them at every turn, relishing in an opportunity to finally have an outlet for the anger that had sustained him for fifteen years.
He sees them now, and they take his breath away. There’s loneliness, guilt, and something achingly soft and sharp and familiar—something that Bradley remembers from his childhood, from early walks to school and midnight snacks in the kitchen.
That, Bradley thinks, is probably what Seresin meant; and while some distant part of him balks at Hangman being right, another, smaller part of him, buried under all the prickly burning anger and tucked away in some corner of his heart, wants to believe that this is love—that it’s still there, that maybe Maverick didn’t mean to cut Bradley out from the sky and everything they shared, that maybe Maverick didn’t mean to cast him aside and leave him out of the one thing that had kept both of them afloat.
”Do you hear me, Bradley?”
Bradley’s lower lip trembles, and Maverick wants nothing more than to reach out and hug him. But he holds himself back, knowing and accepting that the younger man would probably swat his arms away. Instead, tempting fate, he repeats himself, and simultaneously readies his defenses for what is sure to be a devastating counterattack.
“I’ve always wanted you.”
”Then why’d you do it?”
The counterattack is quick, like Maverick knew it would be. There’s no hesitation from Rooster now, and the kid’s eyes are sharp and unyielding, laser-focused on Maverick. Dimly, Maverick thinks he hears the telltale tone of a missile locking into place.
Carole’s ghost holds his mouth shut, so he readies himself for a maneuver that will probably get him killed after all.
”You weren’t ready.”
”Bullshit.”
Maverick looks over, but there’s no animosity in Bradley’s tone—just an even appraisal, and Maverick feels uncomfortably laid bare.
”I’m going to ask one more time, Mav; and then after that, I’m done asking.”
Maverick’s head spins, going a hundred miles an hour in several directions all at once. One, the kid called him ‘Mav.’ He doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Two, it isn’t explicit but Maverick knows it’s been said anyway: this is his last chance. After this, Bradley will walk away again, disappear from his life again—and Maverick’s heart won’t be able to take it a second time.
“Why did you pull my papers, Mav? Why did you stand in my way?”
Abort, abort! Maverick closes his eyes and his instincts scream wildly at him as the visages of Carole and Goose swim before his mind’s eye.
Bradley watches his father figure’s face contort in indecision and the disappointment within him slowly grows larger than the hope; the hope gets ready to fold in on itself again, ready to be tucked back away into the deepest recesses of his treacherous heart, nothing but a memory in the face of unforgiving truth.
If he answers, sticks to his guns, Carole’s secret will be safe. Maverick will have kept his promise to the woman he loves like a sister, the wife of the man he had gotten killed. He’ll travel down the road a bit closer to absolution, and maybe not be slapped on the face when he finally sees her again.
If he answers, sticks to his guns, he loses Bradley forever—and Maverick thinks he’d meet Goose and Carole earlier, if it came to that. A world without Bradley would be too heavy to live in. As it is, Maverick’s barely survived these past fifteen years; and probably lived through over half of that by taking to the skies in increasingly reckless flights, rather than staying on the ground where the landslide of guilt threatened to bury him daily.
If he answers, truthfully, he opens up Carole’s venerated memory and makes her vulnerable, possibly hated by the son she loved more than life. He betrays the woman he had wronged the most in this world, one final time.
If he answers, truthfully (selfishly), he gets a chance at rebuilding his world with Bradley in it.
It’s an impossible choice.
It isn’t a choice at all.
I’m sorry, Carole.
”Your mom—after what happened to Goose, she wanted to keep you away from what had taken her husband. She made me promise, and I did it the only way I knew how.”
Of course, it hadn’t been enough. It seemed Bradshaw men were meant to be in the sky, and Bradley had clawed his way there all on his own. In the end, Maverick had failed his promise after all.
Bradley closes his eyes and lays his head back on the wall. Damn you, Seresin.
“I—I am sorry, Bradley. I know it doesn’t mean anything but I am.”
He shouldn’t be apologizing. Bradley knows how much Mav loved his mom and dad, how he would do anything for them or their memory, if his childhood was anything to go by. Of course Maverick had tried his utter best to honor his mom’s dying wish. Bradley couldn’t begrudge him that.
”And she told you to keep it from me?”
Maverick swallows. Come on, Maverick, one last dive. “No. I did that all on my own.”
Bradley opens his eyes and whips his head to the side. His mouth feels dry. “What?”
”You were always going to resent me for doing what I did. You shouldn’t have to resent your mom too.” And Maverick is mournful when saying it, but quietly sure. There’s no world in which he would have allowed sweet, dead Carole to be the subject of her son’s vitriol when he found out that the sky had been pushed out of his reach.
There’s not much else in the way of words that Maverick can push out from his broken body and bruised heart, but he tries anyway.
”But that didn’t mean I never wanted you,” Maverick continues desperately, more fierce but just as sure. “I will always, always want you in my life, Bradley. From the day Goose gave you to me to hold. I’ve always wanted you.”
It’s too much—Bradley curls into himself, unsure of the maelstrom inside him, love for his mom warring with indignation, anger at Maverick clashing with a sudden guilt. Maverick had loved Bradley, had done his best with what he had, and Bradley had punished him for it. For fifteen years he had lived with that anger, and it leaves him now like a wildfire, nothing but ashes in its wake.
He turns away, knees tucked close to his chest, trying to ground himself in the cement wall, the asphalt, the dull pain of pulling his hair out. His hands tangle in his hair as he pushes his forehead into his knees, breathing coming faster and faster—
“Bradley? Bradley!”
He hears the alarm behind him but doesn’t have the strength to run away. “Go away, Mav. Please, I—I can’t…right now…”
Maverick’s heart breaks and mends in equal measure, and he gets himself back up on cracking knees to crouch in front of the younger man, the skilled aviator, the kid whose wounds he dressed and fears he soothed.
And there’s so much he’s out of practice in, but he does know how to do this.
“Somehow I don’t think you should be alone right now, kiddo,” he tries, and is rewarded by the lifting of that head, faced with teary eyes. His heart cracks again as he gives a faint smile, one hand tentatively reaching up to brush away those tears. When Bradley doesn’t flinch, doesn’t move away, Maverick gains a little more courage, and cups that reddened cheek in his hand. It feels jarringly unfamiliar yet familiar all at once.
”There you are.”
And Bradley doesn’t feel like he deserves this—this soft touch, the tender look in Maverick’s eyes that soothes over the wildfire aftermath just a little bit, cool and calm in a way that Bradley hasn’t seen since his childhood years. His other hand comes up to rest on his shoulder, grounding and firm.
He doesn’t deserve this—but he can’t look away.
He tips his head forward and drops his knees, slotting perfectly into Maverick’s open arms with a quiet sob. Maverick grunts as he takes his weight and settles down from his crouch so that he sits on the asphalt again, somehow engulfing a whole aviator in his arms.
And Maverick can’t believe this, has to pinch himself to believe that he isn’t dreaming, that he won’t wake up in his trailer again like so many nights before, where this sweetness came just before dark reality.
On those nights, if he was honest with himself, he had wished never to wake up.
But this isn’t a dream, and Bradley is here, and he’s holding his whole world in his arms, one tousled head of curls pressed against his chest, shoulders shaking with repressed sobs. It’s instinct, it’s practice, it’s innate in Maverick to bring his arms up and surround the younger man with as much peace as he can provide.
They stay there seconds, minutes, it could have been hours; and Maverick is content to stay there forever. He presses a firm kiss onto that head of curls and lays his cheek upon it, at one point humming a lullaby that had helped a younger Bradley go back to sleep. He doesn’t sing the words, because there’s too much raw wounds between the two of them, but he does hum the melody—and by the way Bradley shifts against his chest and curls in even closer than Maverick thought humanly possible, he remembers it too.
I’ll hold your hand / And I’ll help you stand / ‘Til one day you walk on your own / And I’ll love you forever / Forever my baby you’ll be / Yes, I’ll love you forever / Forever and ever, my baby you’ll be / Forever and always, my baby you’ll be
Bradley is undone, pulled apart at the seams; and if Mav weren’t holding him, he thinks he would’ve melted straight into the ground. It’s an eternity before he pulls back, looking down in shame, but Maverick takes a gentle hand and tips his chin up.
The soft smile on his dad’s face is full of promises Bradley can’t even fathom. “I love you, Bradley,” he says, and suddenly Bradley is twelve and going up in the sky for the first time with his dad, the whole expanse before him beckoning an adventure. It’s a lightness he hasn’t felt for fifteen years, and it almost feels pathetic, the way he keeps crawling back for it like a child—but somehow, he can’t bring himself to care.
He doesn’t say it back, not yet—not because he doesn’t, but because he doesn’t know how to paper over fifteen years of ignored voicemails and sent-back letters and packages. It doesn’t seem right or fair, for all those years to be forgiven with just three words.
He shakes his head. “Mav, I—I was horrible to you—how…”
”Shush,” Maverick says, fifteen years of pain paling in the light of a few minutes with his son in his arms. “The past is past, remember?”
Bradley shakes his head, because absolution cannot be that easy, and his sharp words come back to haunt him. You’d like to believe that, wouldn’t you?
”You can’t forgive me just like that.”
And everything within Maverick rallies, because there is no way in hell he’s letting his godson stew in the guilt for something he alone should carry. ”Of course I can. You’re my kid, remember?”
The warmth spikes in Bradley’s heart all the way down to his toes. My kid. Not my pilot, or my squad member, or even my friend’s son—my kid. It makes all the difference.
“And,” he sobers. “I’m the one who should be asking forgiveness, Bradley. I am sorry, for what it’s worth.”
It feels empty, trite—but Maverick is going to spend the rest of his time here on earth making it real.
Bradley searches his dad’s eyes again and finds nothing there but sincerity. He thinks it’s time he met that with some of his own.
”I forgive you,” he says seriously, and some of the clouds on the horizon lift as Maverick’s eyes widen. “I still have so many questions,” he admits slowly. “But—maybe we have time.”
There’s the hope again, growing larger than Bradley ever let it be. If he’s rejected now, he doesn’t think the hope will survive.
Time. It used to be a punishment for Maverick—time spooling out before him in monotonous emptiness, a dirt road he had to march through with no prospect of joy, when the only light in his world had stormed out of his life.
And now—he has time. They have time. They have time to figure everything out, to find out how to live with each other without crashing together, how to explore the skies of their relationship without losing their bearings.
It’s exhilarating. It’s terrifying.
But looking into his son’s eyes, it’s all that matters. “Yeah,” he says roughly, swallowing back his own tears as he beholds the boy he thought he lost, and somehow found. “Yeah, Bradley. We’ve got time.”
Later that evening
”Who are you texting?”
”Seresin,” Bradley says with a smirk. “He owes me ten bucks.”
And Maverick, who was there for that conversation, throws his head back and laughs.